Tuesday, October 28, 2014

Limiting Births Fails to Save Earth: Gov't Report

A new study from the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, which receives 85% of its funding from President Obama's federal government agencies, has concluded that even a world-wide one-child policy for population control is not enough. The Academy's environmentalists, concerned that humans are destroying the planet, also determined that even massive deaths from cataclysmic events such as nuclear war and unprecedented pandemics would not succeed in saving the non-human life of the Earth.

“We were surprised that a five-year WWIII scenario mimicking the same proportion of people killed in the First World War and Second World War combined, barely registered a blip on the human population trajectory this century.”-- Professor Barry Brook, Ecologist, University of Adelaide

According to a new study, controlling population growth will not solve global issues of sustainability in the short term. The study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences stated that if the world follows one-child policy, then the number of people in 2100 remained around current levels.

The study also reported that even if a catastrophic event in the future kills billions of people, it would have a little effect on the overall impact. According to the study, in 2100, there will be about 12 billion people on the earth.

The authors of the study stated that about 14% of all the humans who ever existed on the earth were alive today. Growth in population means an impact on the environment than ever. In near future, humans will have to face problems like conversion of forests for agriculture, climate change, pollution and rise of urbanization.

And older people today still think population is the problem, though since food and energy are not major issues, they argue culling humanity might be necessary to save the environment. New multi-scenario modeling of world human population has concluded that even mandatory sterilization or abortions or a mass kill-off would not bring about large enough change to solve issues of global sustainability as they are portrayed. So World War III won't save the planet.

Writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, ecologists Professor Corey Bradshaw and Professor Barry Brook from the University of Adelaide's Environment Institute say instead that we should focus on policies and technologies that reverse rising consumption of natural resources and enhance recycling for more immediate sustainability gains.

New multi-scenario modelling of world human population has concluded that even stringent fertility restrictions or a catastrophic mass mortality would not bring about large enough change this century to solve issues of global sustainability. . . .

Fertility reduction efforts, however, through increased family-planning assistance and education, should still be pursued, as this will lead to hundreds of millions fewer people to feed by mid-century.

The researchers constructed nine different scenarios for continuing population ranging from "business as usual" through various fertility reductions, to highly unlikely broad-scale catastrophes resulting in billions of deaths.

The picture is complicated by the fact that while the overall [worldwide population] figures have been growing, the world's per-capita fertility has been declining for several decades.

"We've gone past the point where we can do it easily, just by the sheer magnitude of the population, what we call the demographic momentum. We just can't stop it fast enough," said Prof Corey Bradshaw from the University of Adelaide.

In their paper, the researchers also look at the impact on numbers of a global catastrophe in the middle of this century. They found that even an event that wiped out two billion people would still leave about eight and a half billion in 2100.

"Our work reveals that effective family planning and reproduction education worldwide have great potential to constrain the size of the human population and alleviate pressure on resource availability over the longer term," said Prof Barry Brook from the University of Tasmania.

Two prominent ecologists, who normally study animal populations in the wild, have concluded that the number of people in the world today will present one of the most daunting problems for sustainable living on the planet in the coming century – even if every country adopts a draconian “one child” policy.

Professor Bradshaw told The Independent that the study was designed to look at human numbers with the insight of an ecologist studying natural impacts on animals to determine whether factors such pandemics and world wars could dramatically influence the population projections.

Simon Ross, the chief executive of the charity Population Matters, said that introducing modern family planning to the developing world would cost less than $4bn – about one third of the UK’s annual aid budget.

“So, while fertility reduction is not a quick fix, it is relatively cheap, reliable, and popular with most, with generally positive side effects. We welcome the recognition of the potential of family planning and reproductive education to alleviate resource availability in the longer term,” Mr Ross said.